On the Pricing of Web Applications.

The blog post titled Account Sharing lands Goldman Sachs in Court, is not only a wake up call to enterprises, but also one for the content providers.

One of the reasons why the account sharing mentioned in the blog post happens is because of the pricing of the service. Yearly pricing models tend to produce the account sharing behavior whereas monthly, or pay-as-you-go, pricing tends to avoid account sharing. Salesforce.com's is an example of monthly pricing.

So, the moral of the story is that content providers can facilitate proper subscriptions from enterprises by offering proper pricing models.

Do CEOs of Collaborating Companies Talk to Each Other?

I guess there is room for all kinds of corporate behavior. In EMC: Enterprise data centers won't all flock to the cloud, where we learn about new storage solutions — called VPlex — from EMC, we also learn the following:

Tucci also criticized the data center verticalization strategy that companies such as Hewlett-Packard and Cisco are taking, saying it will lead to a new kind of lock-in that will ultimately lend itself to inefficiency. He said EMC’s private cloud strategy swaps out verticalization with virtualization and allows all of your data center solution providers — even EMC competitors — to plug in.

Now, you will recall that the Virtual Computing Environment collaboration was setup with good amount of fanfare: Power of 3 - VMware, Cisco, EMC and so on. You would think that there is a better way for EMC to promote the launch of VPlex than to deride a collaboration partner, in this case Cisco, right? Wrong. EMC finds it necessary to talk down Cisco.

The power of a coalition such as the VCE lies in the integration and the attendant advantages: data centers can deploy well integrated pieces rather than waste precious time in stringing together components: servers, networking, storage.

I guess it takes corporations of all kinds to make up the world.

[Why] Is JavaScript Popular?

When one has to extend the experience of web browsing beyond what comes out of browser-makers, a key programming language that everyone seeks refuge in is JavaScript.

In my previous post, I wrote about Google Apps Script that enables customization and integration of Google Documents and Products through JavaScript that is executed on the server, in the cloud.

Now, with this additional flexibility at the server, you can expect more adaptation of product and computational functionality by Internet application users themselves by using JavaScript.

The use that JavaScript can be put both in providing Rich Internet Applications — e.g., Google's Gmail — on the client side and in customizing server side logic in the form, for example, of Google Apps Script will only increase the popularity of JavaScript. Even if other languages -- Java, C++, Ruby on Rails, etc. -- are used for implementing server-side functionality, there is a certain homogeneity that is brought about by the use of JavaScript on both sides.

Google Acquires BumpTop.

Google acquisition today of BumpTop is an exciting prospect for making a non-browser based OS irrelevant as the future unfolds. You can even see a multi-touch interface version in this YouTube video.

The future desktop, and TVs, will definitely deserve this; maybe some laptops and netbooks will get this as well.

On a Blogger's Meetup.

Blogging is an activity that has gotten well fostered, thanks to the web. I had an opportunity to participate in a meetup conducted by Bill Belew, for bloggers. In addition of course to Bill, I met bloggers who focused in a wide variety of interests:

1. Different kinds of chocolates
2. Writing about Writing
3. What you sow, so you reap, a healthy approach to living
4. IT Tutoring
5. Individual Approach to Financial Management
6. Promotion of English among Chinese
7. Boomer Grandparents
8. Raw Foods
9. Fierce Planet, on Earthquakes and Other Natural Disasters
10. A new blogger who is focused on art

It is quite refreshing to see that blogging as an activity is not only very mainstream, but can be harnessed to generate some side income as well.

An interesting factoid: Nearly everyone else in the meetup used Wordpress; I was the only Blogger user.

Scripting for the Google Web

Not too long ago, Google announced the availability of scripting for the web for Google Apps Standard Edition customers too. If you play with a little bit, you will begin to see the power of JavaScript in its ability to provide meaningful automating capability to web documents, particularly as it is being promoted by Google.

A very interesting application in automating — screenscraping as it is called by the author, Tony Hirst — can be studied here:
Screenscraping With Google Spreadsheets App Script and the =importHTML() Formula.
The author illustrates how council elections results of the town of Lichfield, UK, can be analyzed using Google App Script.

While the Internet is well known to be a great equalizer, it is also true that it also a great personalizer, thanks to scripting everywhere -- at the [browser] client and in the [server in the] cloud.

A Benefit of a Cloud-based Service: Immense Scalability.

Recent hack-ins into Google infrastructure are definitely disturbing. While we can imagine all kinds of preventive measures — intrusion detection systems, intrusion prevention systems, borderless security, etc. — Google's introduction today of a method of detecting suspicious account activity is a highly useful one. It enables every account holder to detect any suspicious activity in his/her Gmail account.

Thanks to the fact that Gmail is cloud-based, every Gmail user gets this feature instantaneously. With apologies to my fellow Frenchmen: Vive la Scalability.

Microsoft has done some good things for the web browser industry too.

For all the flak that Microsoft has had to take in recent weeks on IE6, it was heartening to learn when Crockford, Yahoo!'s JavaScript Architect, mentioned yesterday that it was Microsoft's contribution to the Document Object Model, that all HTML elements were made script-able, that has provided lasting value so far, for the browser platform.

A couple of other noteworthy points:

1. "With Ajax, the source of innovation shifted from the browser makers to the web developers. Ajax libraries."
2. "Ultimately, we should seek to replace the DOM with an Ajax-influenced API."

Crockford is an engaging speaker who sprinkles his talk with very effective humor. This particular talk was how the Ajax technology came about. You can review all of his talk, including video & transcripts, on the Yahoo! User Interface Blog site.

As I have listened to Crockford on the 4 out of the 5 sessions so far, I cannot but come away with the feeling that many of the mistakes of the past would not have been committed in the latest specification.

The future of web-based applications is definitely brighter.

On CrisisCamp Haiti Silicon Valley

It is amazing to realize how remote technical experts can help in disaster relief efforts even as they start far from the point of disaster. Clearly, it is the power of the Internet. A case in point is my experience yesterday afternoon with the CrisisCamp Haiti Silicon Valley in Microsoft Campus, 1065 La Avenida Street, Mountain View, CA.

The sheer energy in the cafeteria was unbelievable!

Additional information:
CrisisCamp Silicon Valley on Facebook
Crisis Commons

Nexus One versus iPhone 3GS

After Google announced Nexus One this morning, there have been several comparisons available on the Internet, e.g., Nexus One vs Motorola Milestone vs iPhone 3GS. This blog post is an attempt to compare the iPhone and Nexus One in tabular form.

Property	iPhone 3GS	Nexus One	Comments
Price	$199 (2-yr)	$79 (upgrade), $179 (2-yr), $529(none)	Nexus One is slightly cheaper.
Weight	135g	130g	Both are equal.
Display	3.5", 480x320	3.7", 800x480	Pictures will appear crisper with the Nexus One: Larger resolution in almost the same real estate.
Camera	3MP, autofocus, no flash	5MP, autofocus, flash	Better resolution camera and flash!
Video	VGA(640x480) up to 30 fps	720x480 pixels at 20 fps	Nexus One is inferior for motion (fps)?
CPU, RAM	600MHz CPU, 256MB	Qualcomm QSD 8250 1 GHz, 512MB	Faster CPU for Nexus One.
Carrier	at&t	T-Mobile; Any, but no support for high speed packet access (HSPA)	Since the Nexus One comes unlocked, you can use any carrier. If data speed is important, stick with T-Mobile.
Location	Accelerometer, digital compass, Assisted GPS	Accelerometer, digital compass, Assisted GPS	Both have similar characteristics.
Non-volatile storage	Built-in 16GB hard disk	Removable 4GB Micro SD (expandable to 32GB)	Expandability may be an advantage for Nexus One.
Battery	Built-in, 1219 mAH, Talk up to 5 hrs, Standby 300 hrs, Internet 5 hrs on 3G	Removable, 1400 mAH, Talk up to 7 hrs, Standby 250 hrs, Internet 5 hrs on 3G	Nexus One has slightly better capacity, is slightly better for voice, and slightly inferior for Standby.
Multitouch experience	Quite uniform	Not many apps exploit it (in Jan 2010).	Nexus One is inferior.
Peripheral interfaces	iPod connector, Bluetooth	mini USB, Bluetooth	Nexus One has no proprietary interfaces.
Software Features	Google Voice is still being evaluated.	All text fields can be spoken to. All of Google software.	Nexus One may have an edge.

What is the bottom line? It is difficult to say without experiencing both the devices but, on "paper", Nexus One appears to have an edge, particularly if you ignore non-availability of multi touch experience uniformly in the Nexus One.

Mashable's Ben Parr provides a non-committal assessment at the CES.

Newer is better, isn't it?

IaaS, PaaS, SaaS, ..., CaaS?

In recent years, cloud computing has gotten everyone excited, and rightly so. After all, who does not like the scalable, elastic and near-instantaneous access to computing (and storage resources)? Today, we learn the formation of the Virtual Computing Environment, a joint partnership among VMware, Cisco & EMC.

With increasing complexity of cloud implementations, it becomes necessary to create an abstraction that hides the details of server CPUs, storage and the networking needed between them. Where would this abstraction live? Where else? In the cloud, public or private. The vBlock package definitions seem to offer a good start for this abstraction. Perhaps we can regard vBlock as Cloud-as-a-Service or CaaS, to accompany the three others - IaaS, PaaS and SaaS.

Is 50Mbit/s enough of backhaul bandwidth?

If we say there are about 1,000 subscribers per cell tower and each will need about 1 Mbit/s bandwidth, 50 Mbit/s will only serve about concurrent 50 users well. Is this enough?
in reference to: Unstrung - Fixed/Mobile Convergence - Sprint: Please, Sir, Can We Have Some More Ethernet Backhaul? - Telecom News Analysis (view on Google Sidewiki)